next »

[tlark]

Wow, I had a reactive day at work yesterday so missed the live stream But just watched it now and WOW! That was amazing. I really appreciate your open, comprehensive, precise and frankness answers. Very thrilling. Very interesting. I will screen it to my wife later too.

Made me want to contribute more, really loved it. Thanks a lot! 

[RossD20Studios]

Wow, I had a reactive day at work yesterday so missed the live stream But just watched it now and WOW! That was amazing. I really appreciate your open, comprehensive, precise and frankness answers. Very thrilling. Very interesting. I will screen it to my wife later too.

Made me want to contribute more, really loved it. Thanks a lot! 

So happy you liked it! Thank you for the kind words, really appreciate that. Hope your wife likes it, too 

[RossD20Studios]

Our finished card border art! Here are 5 of our 6 card types. From left to right, they are Celestial, Void, Chaos, Arcane, and Nature. The one that is missing is Earthen, which is our Neutral card type. I will detail these further in a future post.

What do you think?


.    .    .    .    .  
We're on Kickstarter! Check out our game trailer & support us at: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1181148431/summoners-fate-fast-and-fun-tactical-rpg-ccg-adven?ref=2g7x7s

[RossD20Studios]

Sunday Sketches - upcoming playable Fairy, Elf Warrior, & Cockatrice in development. The Fairy and Cockatrice will have flying capabilities in the game.

What do you think? Really pumped to see these finished & animated.

We're on Kickstarter! Click on the image above to head to our KS Campaign page and watch our game trailer.

[RossD20Studios]

I'm happy to announce we've been FUNDED in 13 days on Kickstarter!
THANK YOU supporters! Kelly & I are pumped!  

We have 10 days left in our Kickstarter, and are now looking toward our fun Stretch Goals. First one is adding a race of Celestial TimeKeeper Steampunk Ratmen race - so strange, it just has to work If you're a fan of Steampunk, time manipulation spells, "good" characters, and/or Rats, this is the Race you've been missing.

Click on the picture above to go to our Kickstarter page.

[RossD20Studios]

Which faction would you play & why? A little about each faction:

Ironclad
Employing their powerful armor, matching ornate shields, and expertly-crafted weapons, the Ironclads venture onto the battlefield with purpose in their hearts - to honor their promise to fight in the name of the Emperor (coming soon)...no matter the cost...

Orcs
Big. Mean. Green. Awesome! These brutes storm the battlefield with giant weapons and leave none safe!

Skeletons
These piles of bones have some unfinished business on the Summoners Fate battlegrounds, and lack any fear of the enemy or dying (of course!). While typically on the weaker side insofar as strength, they have much safety in terrifying numbers...

Dreadnoughts
They have chosen to fight for destruction and havoc. Sealed inside their enormous heavy armor, they have devoted themselves completely to being bringers of mayhem.

Reptilians
The Reptis - what we call our Reptilian race - are a race of humanoid reptilian creatures native to the lush jungles that populate the lands of Summoners Fate. Their ranks consist of tall, ignanae/croc/dino lizard like hominids, smaller frilled lizard bipeds, and half humanoid, half serpentine creatures.

[RossD20Studios]

This screenshot is inspired by one of my favorite miniature based board games. Here's a few clues to look for:

1. The staircase
2. The heroes in the party (3 out of 4 staple characters of this board game are shown)
3. The furniture

Can you guess which board game inspired this dungeon?


9 days left on Kickstarter! We'd love your support if you enjoy this type of genre. Click on the screenshot above to visit our KS page.

[RossD20Studios]

Below the goal, what happened?!

Yesterday we were well along the way towards hitting our first stretch goal, and I was hoping to spend today’s update talking about all the awesome time control abilities we have planned for the Celestial Time Keeper Rats. But, as you may have noticed, we are below our funding goal this morning. What happened?

In the past several days, our project has seen some volatility: a handful of folks made substantial pledges and then canceled them without any explanation. Kelly and I are both shocked and devastated by the painful emotional effect of sharing our success with you and now having to retract on that. As one who has experienced a fair share of bad news in the game industry, however, I believe open and honest communication is best.

While it is unpleasant to bring you this news, know that Kelly and I are not deterred. We maintain faith in those of you still behind us. With your support, in these last 8 days, we will see this project through as promised!

[RossD20Studios]

While this morning was a bit of a disappointment for Kelly and me with our Kickstarter funding going from 106% to 92% overnight, we've been overjoyed by the encouraging messages we've received, thank you.  

So - what now? Well, we are two pretty tenacious folks and we knew the startup life was not going to be an easy one. We are even more determined to make the Kickstarter a success with our 8 days left, and still have quite big plans for our game!

One of those big plans is adding a unique and fun Insectoid race! These are insects that are quite large and humanoid in their actions. Here's a "glamour shot" of some of them:



Don't they look...cute and creepy?! LOL, that's a bit what we were going for. I really like insects, and knew I wanted to get them into our game as a playable race. I especially like praying mantises and ants. However, I definitely dislike yellowjackets in real life for all the times they've stung me while doing yardwork. I wanted to add them to the game as a way to defeat them on our battlefield! If you feel the same way, these may be the perfect opponent for you.

Here are some examples of their animations:  

                        Scorpion Wasp                                                                  Mantis
 

                                            Bug Bonanza








What do you think?

[RossD20Studios]

Now that's what we call atmospheric storytelling 

[RossD20Studios]

Meet our Angel playable character! We think she is a great addition to the lineup, but cannot figure out a weapon for her - sword? Mace? Enchanted harp?

Let us know! Pictures are welcome 

[RossD20Studios]

6 days left in our Kickstarter for Summoners Fate, and we're at about 97% funded! (Click on our picture, or click here to see our Kickstarter) THANK YOU!

Kelly and I are a hard-working duo who love games like Dark Sun Series D&D PC Games Shattered Lands and Wake of the Ravager, Warcraft, Diablo, Warhammer tabletop (Fantasy & 40K), MtG, and - of course - our first game, Hero Mages. Our hope is that Summoners Fate will bring many exciting elements of varied turn-based strategy games and combine them into a fun, fast, and tactically satisfying experience with diversity in characters, strategies, and platforms. We plan for Summoners Fate to entertain you for years to come.

We'd greatly appreciate your support. Check our our Kickstarter here.Thanks, fellow IndieDevs!  

[RossD20Studios]

We filmed this Summoners Fate First Look - Choose Your Device video today, which showcases some hands-on gameplay on all of our target platforms. As you will see, our game supports portrait and landscape orientations, as well as adapts for left- and right-handedness with a simple turn of the device.

Our vector graphics scale beautifully to large PC screens and high DPI retina screens. We've received feedback from some of our PC fans about the UI and we are planning to build a custom PC UI as well as support hotkeys and an alternative "zoomed out" interface with more detail/options panels for players that like to have this additional information handy.

Check out the video, let us know what you think!

[RossD20Studios]

We have received some great feedback and discussions from the game play video I posted here yesterday, thanks! Come join me in our Summoners Fate Discord, I'm chatting right now at: https://discord.gg/6rZkzAx.

Every new member is greeted with a Summoners Fate character

[RossD20Studios]

Here's a follow up video to our "first look" video with an additional battle vs. the Liche King (click here to see). This time, I'm recording directly from my computer so the visual quality is much higher. At players' request, I'll be creating a larger map and sharing that next. Stay tuned for the next video!

[RossD20Studios]

If you missed my wife & my recorded livestream, it's now up on YouTube. Check out our discussion about Summoners Fate as we answer viewers' questions about the game & our development process.

While you're there, click Subscribe to assure you get our latest videos. Typically I will post videos there first before our other social media.

[RossD20Studios]

Skeleton gets defeated by Barbarian knockback to the spike wall (a great addition because of a suggestion of one of our players). In slow-motion to really savor that defeat!



Have a great evening! 

[RossD20Studios]

We've received some requests to view a gameplay video on a larger map, and we are happy to oblige! I also added in the spike walls that was requested, which was a lot of fun and changed my strategy for the better. Originally, the walls only served as a decorative border, but after spending some time, I got this working.

Here I am playing as the Liche King & Skeletons on a larger map on my PC:

[RossD20Studios]

We have 3 days left on our Kickstarter! Click here to check out our page. We are aiming toward our 1st Stretch Goals, the Celestial Steampunk Timekeeper Rats  . Here are some concept sketches:



As you can see from the sketch above, the rats are inspired by Victorian-era clothing and have clockwork gear weapons and gadgetry. Kelly was very particular about the look and spent a lot of time gathering various concepts to inform our art team so that these would read as unique, original characters. As Kelly would say, "These aren't your typical dirty sewer rats, but prim and proper rats with sophisticated tastes and culture. They can control time, after all."

Along with the Rats are the time manipulation spells, which will be a lot of chaotic fun for the game:



You might be wondering how we are planning to implement manipulation of time in our game mechanics. Here are just a few examples of what will be possible with our game engine:

Time Trap: When unit enters target space, undo the last interaction and end that unit's turn. (Traps are deployed on the board in secret)
Turn Back Time: Rewind to the start of your last turn and remove this card from the game.
Time Travel: Remove your Summoner from the board until the start of your next turn.

[Pixel Noise]

That looks really cool! Congrats on being funded and good luck on your stretch goals!